IITs to ISB, Placements at Top Institutes Unaffected by Slowdown

The Indian economy is facing its worst slowdown in over five years, with the GDP growth rate falling from 5 percent to 4.5 percent in the second quarter of the financial year 2019-20. This, at a time when India is witnessing record levels of unemployment, stoked apprehension regarding job prospects among students graduating this year.

But news coming in from Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian School of Business (ISB) at the end of the first few days of this placement season indicates that students at these premier institutes are shielded from the effects of the economic slowdown as far as job offers are concerned.

IITs saw more than 4,000 job offers being awarded in the first two days of placements alone. Here is how these institutes fared individually:

Indian School of Business (Hyderabad and Mohali)

• Students at ISB received 1,383 job offers on Day 1, an increase from the 1,194 offers received last year
  
• The 16 percent increase in job offers on Day 1 saw 85 percent of the batch placed on the said day itself. ISB has two campuses, one in Hyderabad and the other in Mohali, and the institute’s students have prior work experience
  
• The students saw a 124 percent jump in their compensation, as compared to their salaries before joining ISB
  
• According to the institute, the average salary awarded to the students was Rs 26 lakh per year
  
• 231 companies, including 65 first-time recruiters, hired from ISB this year. Google, Amazon, Electronic Arts, Flipkart, Microsoft, Ola, Uber and Zomato featured among the regulars who returned for placements at ISB

IIT Bombay

• Microsoft was the company offering the highest package at IIT Bombay for the third year in a row. The software giant made offers of around Rs 1.17 crore with additional components like stock options and joining bonus raising the package value to around Rs 1.5 crore, similar to what the company had offered the previous year
  
• Uber offered pay packages of USD 143,000 (around Rs 1.02 crore) for profiles based in the United States
  
• The highest domestic offers at IIT Bombay included a Rs 32.59 lakh package by Qualcomm, a Rs 32 lakh package from Google, and a Rs 31.5 lakh one by Goldman Sachs. This marked a dip from the top domestic offers last year, when US-based equity firm Blackstone had offered packages up to Rs 45 lakh for roles based in India

IIT Madras

• IIT-Madras students were awarded 102 job offers on Day 1 of placements
  
• This was an increase of 20 percent from the 85 job offers given on Day 1 during the previous year of placements
  
• Of the 102 offers at IIT Madras, the biggest recruiters were Microsoft with 20 offers, Goldman Sachs with 11 and Qualcomm with nine
  
• Students received four international offers, with one offer each by Microsoft, Uber, Salesforce and Cohesity

IIT Delhi

• Day 1 of placements at IIT Delhi witnessed the highest ever number of offers for an opening day at the institute
  
• Among the 244 offers made on the first day, 240 were for domestic roles and four were for positions abroad
  
• Of the four international offers, two were made by Microsoft, one by Uber and one by Squarepoint Singapore

“I am really happy to have got what I want. I was aiming for a consulting company and I have been placed at Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Most of my friends have got placed as well.”

Pratham Mehta, Chemical Engineering student at IIT Delhi

• 400 organisations are participating in the placement season, offering over 600 profiles, apart from the 175 pre-placement offers received by students
  
• However, Google and Apple have given IIT Delhi placements a miss this time, as per an IIT Delhi official who spoke to The Quint

“I can confidently say that the economic situation of the country has not affected the placements at IIT-Delhi.”

Selvamuthhu Dharmaraja, Head of Office of Career Services (OCS) at IIT Delhi

Biggest Recruiters at IIT Delhi

• The highest number of offers came from Microsoft with the software giant offering jobs to 30 students
  
• Intel gave 27 domestic offers to the students, while Qualcomm and Goldman Sachs provided 16 and 12 offers respectively

IIT Roorkee

• From 322 jobs offered on the first day in 2018, this year, IIT Roorkee saw a total of 363 jobs being offered on the inaugural day of placement season
  
• Three students from IIT Roorkee got job offers of Rs 1.54 crore per annum from an American multinational company, a record for placements at IIT Roorkee

IIT Hyderabad

• Placement season at IIT Hyderabad began with 53 offers from 15 companies on Day 1
  
• Six of those offers were for positions abroad. These were from companies like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, SMS DataTech and NTT Advanced Technology
  
• Microsoft made 17 offers at the institute, and Goldman Sachs made three
  
• A total of 224 companies have registered themselves for the first phase of the placements, , an increase from last year’s tally of 150
  
• Some companies, such as BookMyShow, Jaguar and Bajaj Auto have registered for placements at IIT Hyderabad for the first time.

Top Recruiter at Premier Institutes: Microsoft

Software giant Microsoft turned out to be the biggest recruiter at several of the top institutes, including at IIT Delhi, IIT Bombay, IIT Madras and IIT Kharagpur.

Another big recruiter in multiple campuses was the semiconductor and telecommunications equipment company Qualcomm.